“Dude, I’ve got a bit of a confession to make,” Seymour said. His heart was about ready to burst out of his chest, but he couldn’t keep lying anymore.
“What’s wrong, brah?” Everett asked, looking up from his phone.
“You know how we say ‘no homo’ everytime we do shit together?”
Everett genuinely had no idea where his friend was going with this. “Yeah? What about it?”
Seymour was so nervous he could barely get the words out. “W-well, what if… it was actually a little, uh… what if it was sorta homo?”
Everett stared at him for what felt like hours, although it was probably only a few seconds.
“I, uhhh… J-just kidding! Haha…”
“Bro, I accept you. Gay, straight, bi, unsexual, or whatever the fuck the word is.”
“Dude, I mean… I’m very homo. Especially for you.”
“Oh.”
The silence lasted longer than Seymour could have anticipated. Everett was never this quiet.
“Holy shit,” Everett said at last. “I think I might be… I think I am too, bro.”
“Y-yeah, I kinda figured that out, I just…”
“Shit, how’m I gonna tell my mom she won’t have grandkids? Hell, how can I tell her I’m a fa—” Everett cut himself off. “Wow. I almost used a shitty word right there. I just—”
“I know. Your mom is—”
“She hates gays, Seymour! I can’t come out to people! God, my brother too. Shit.”
“Dude, I’m not sure I’ll ever tell anyone either. Just a secret between bros?”
“… Yeah. Just between us.”
In retrospect, Seymour wasn’t sure why he expected that to go badly. They had sex every other night, albeit with the lights off so they could pretend they were banging a girl (even though they both definitely didn’t imagine any girls while they screwed). They cuddled sometimes, kissed, even flirted on purpose sometimes.
Seymour loved Everett, and while he was fucking terrified of how he felt, he felt safest when he was in Everett’s arms. And he knew Everett felt the same. Safest when his arms were around Seymour.
They might never be able to come out of the closet, but they shared that space now.